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Hurricane Sandy kills 41 in Caribbean, targets U.S.
NASSAU (Reuters) - Hurricane Sandy, a late-season Atlantic storm unlike anything seen in more than two decades, slogged slowly toward the U.S. East Coast on Friday after killing at least 41 people as it cut across the Caribbean.
Forecasters said Sandy, with an expanding wind field already 550 miles wide, had begun merging with a polar air mass over the eastern United States, potentially spawning a hybrid "super storm" that could wreak havoc along the East Coast.
"Its structure is evolving as we speak because it's interacting with this weather feature at higher levels of the atmosphere," said Todd Kimberlain, a forecaster at the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
"The models are suggesting that the storm could actually become better organized or intensify a little bit, not due to the normal processes than we would expect for a tropical cyclone but more related to this weather feature," Kimberlain said.
On its current projected track, government forecasters said Sandy could make landfall early next week anywhere between Virginia, Maryland or Delaware up through New York or southern New England.
In New York City, the global financial hub, officials were considering closing down mass transit before the storm hits.
Coming in the final weeks before the presidential election on November 6, the storm could throw last-minute campaign travel plans into chaos.
An aide to Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney said he had canceled a campaign event scheduled for Sunday night in Virginia Beach, Virginia. The Obama campaign said it was closely monitoring the storm.
The Democratic incumbent was traveling to New Hampshire on Saturday and on Monday was due to visit Youngstown, Ohio, and Orlando, Florida.
Much of Florida's northeast coast was under a tropical storm warning on Friday, and storm watches extended up the coast through North Carolina. Winds and rains generated by Sandy were being felt across much of Florida, with schools closed and air travel snarled in many areas.
Sandy weakened to a Category 1 storm as it tore though sparsely populated low-lying southeastern islands in the Bahamas late Thursday, knocking out power and blowing rooftops off some homes.
One storm-related death was reported in the Bahamas. Police said it was under investigation, but it occurred in Lyford Cay, a wealthy enclave of New Providence island that is home to the likes of actor Sean Connery, hedge fund billionaire Louis Bacon and Canadian fashion mogul Peter Nygard.
Sandy's driving rains and heavy winds were blamed for 40 deaths elsewhere in the Caribbean, where landslides and flash floods were triggered by the cyclone.
Photos: Sandy threatening East Coast
Next
Prev
Photo By The Miami Herald, Carl Juste 15 hrs ago
Locals walk across the flooded streets of La Plaine, Haiti, Thursday, Oct. 25, 2012, after Hurricane Sandy caused flooding and claimed three lives. Hurricane Sandy roared across Cuba overnight, making... more
The Cuban government said Sandy killed 11 people when it tore across the island on Thursday. The storm took at least 26 other lives in deeply impoverished Haiti and three people were killed in neighboring Dominican Republic and Jamaica.
The Haitian dead included a family of five in Grand-Goave, west of the capital Port-au-Prince, killed in a landslide that destroyed their home, authorities said.
The Cuban fatalities were unusual for the communist ruled country that has long prided itself on protecting its people from storms by ordering mass evacuations.
The National Hurricane Center said Sandy was about 430 miles south-southeast of Charleston, South Carolina, on Friday afternoon packing top sustained winds of 75 miles per hour (120 km per hour).
'A CATASTROPHIC STORM'
Sandy was forecast to remain a Category 1 hurricane as it moves over the Bahamas, sending swirling rains and winds across areas including Florida.
The Bahamas Electricity Corporation, which supplies power to most of the Bahamas, said Sandy had caused power outages on several of the islands.
Sandy was expected to move past the Bahamas by Friday evening and churn north toward the U.S. coast. Its speed was 7 mph, however, making its final trek across the central and northwest corner of the Bahamas islands very slow going.
Forecasters said Sandy was expected to come ashore in the United States late Monday or early Tuesday.
"A large number of folks over a very large area of many, many states are going to experience a significant wind event of strong tropical-force winds to perhaps near hurricane-force winds covering a large area," said James Franklin, branch chief of the National Hurricane Center.
Storm surge and coastal or inland flooding were also big causes for concern, forecasters said.
"It's going to be a long-lasting event, two to three days of impacts for a lot of people," Franklin said.
Sandy, dubbed "Frankenstorm" by one government forecaster, was unique because of its integration with the polar trough over the United States.
"We went through this same sort of thing back about 20 years ago around Halloween in 1991 with the 'Perfect Storm,'" Kimberlain said.
That storm, featured in a book and movie of that name, combined several different storm systems to ravage the East Coast.
Some forecasters are warning that Sandy could be more destructive than last year's Hurricane Irene, which caused billions of dollars in damage as it battered the U.S. Northeast.
"This will then be a catastrophic storm for the Middle Atlantic and Northeast. It will not be a purely tropical system, with a core of powerful winds near the center, but rather more like a Nor'easter, with strong winds over a larger area," said a forecast report on Friday from AccuWeather.com.
"Damaging winds will affect areas from Virginia up into New York and New England, leading to widespread power outages and property damage," it said.
At $4.3 billion in losses, last year's Irene ranks as one of the 10 costliest hurricanes, according to the Insurance Information Institute, an industry group.
Along North Carolina's fragile Outer Banks barrier islands that jut out into the Atlantic, vacationers in large camper trailers and motor homes streamed out on Friday and the National Park Service prepared to close beaches to off-road vehicles in preparation for gale-force winds and storm surges.
Winds over 50 mph were expected by the weekend, causing strong beach erosion and ocean overwash on Hatteras Island's only highway as Sandy skirts by offshore, Dare County Emergency Management officials said.
Visitors centers and beaches in the Cape Hatteras National Seashore, which attracts thousands of vacationers in the summer but is less crowded in the fall, were to close late on Saturday and remain shut until the storm passes, officials said.
http://news.yahoo.com/hurricane-sandy-menaces-u-slamming-cuba-035520293.html
Forecasters said Sandy, with an expanding wind field already 550 miles wide, had begun merging with a polar air mass over the eastern United States, potentially spawning a hybrid "super storm" that could wreak havoc along the East Coast.
"Its structure is evolving as we speak because it's interacting with this weather feature at higher levels of the atmosphere," said Todd Kimberlain, a forecaster at the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
"The models are suggesting that the storm could actually become better organized or intensify a little bit, not due to the normal processes than we would expect for a tropical cyclone but more related to this weather feature," Kimberlain said.
On its current projected track, government forecasters said Sandy could make landfall early next week anywhere between Virginia, Maryland or Delaware up through New York or southern New England.
In New York City, the global financial hub, officials were considering closing down mass transit before the storm hits.
Coming in the final weeks before the presidential election on November 6, the storm could throw last-minute campaign travel plans into chaos.
An aide to Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney said he had canceled a campaign event scheduled for Sunday night in Virginia Beach, Virginia. The Obama campaign said it was closely monitoring the storm.
The Democratic incumbent was traveling to New Hampshire on Saturday and on Monday was due to visit Youngstown, Ohio, and Orlando, Florida.
Much of Florida's northeast coast was under a tropical storm warning on Friday, and storm watches extended up the coast through North Carolina. Winds and rains generated by Sandy were being felt across much of Florida, with schools closed and air travel snarled in many areas.
Sandy weakened to a Category 1 storm as it tore though sparsely populated low-lying southeastern islands in the Bahamas late Thursday, knocking out power and blowing rooftops off some homes.
One storm-related death was reported in the Bahamas. Police said it was under investigation, but it occurred in Lyford Cay, a wealthy enclave of New Providence island that is home to the likes of actor Sean Connery, hedge fund billionaire Louis Bacon and Canadian fashion mogul Peter Nygard.
Sandy's driving rains and heavy winds were blamed for 40 deaths elsewhere in the Caribbean, where landslides and flash floods were triggered by the cyclone.
Photos: Sandy threatening East Coast
Next
Prev
Photo By The Miami Herald, Carl Juste 15 hrs ago
Locals walk across the flooded streets of La Plaine, Haiti, Thursday, Oct. 25, 2012, after Hurricane Sandy caused flooding and claimed three lives. Hurricane Sandy roared across Cuba overnight, making... more
The Cuban government said Sandy killed 11 people when it tore across the island on Thursday. The storm took at least 26 other lives in deeply impoverished Haiti and three people were killed in neighboring Dominican Republic and Jamaica.
The Haitian dead included a family of five in Grand-Goave, west of the capital Port-au-Prince, killed in a landslide that destroyed their home, authorities said.
The Cuban fatalities were unusual for the communist ruled country that has long prided itself on protecting its people from storms by ordering mass evacuations.
The National Hurricane Center said Sandy was about 430 miles south-southeast of Charleston, South Carolina, on Friday afternoon packing top sustained winds of 75 miles per hour (120 km per hour).
'A CATASTROPHIC STORM'
Sandy was forecast to remain a Category 1 hurricane as it moves over the Bahamas, sending swirling rains and winds across areas including Florida.
The Bahamas Electricity Corporation, which supplies power to most of the Bahamas, said Sandy had caused power outages on several of the islands.
Sandy was expected to move past the Bahamas by Friday evening and churn north toward the U.S. coast. Its speed was 7 mph, however, making its final trek across the central and northwest corner of the Bahamas islands very slow going.
Forecasters said Sandy was expected to come ashore in the United States late Monday or early Tuesday.
"A large number of folks over a very large area of many, many states are going to experience a significant wind event of strong tropical-force winds to perhaps near hurricane-force winds covering a large area," said James Franklin, branch chief of the National Hurricane Center.
Storm surge and coastal or inland flooding were also big causes for concern, forecasters said.
"It's going to be a long-lasting event, two to three days of impacts for a lot of people," Franklin said.
Sandy, dubbed "Frankenstorm" by one government forecaster, was unique because of its integration with the polar trough over the United States.
"We went through this same sort of thing back about 20 years ago around Halloween in 1991 with the 'Perfect Storm,'" Kimberlain said.
That storm, featured in a book and movie of that name, combined several different storm systems to ravage the East Coast.
Some forecasters are warning that Sandy could be more destructive than last year's Hurricane Irene, which caused billions of dollars in damage as it battered the U.S. Northeast.
"This will then be a catastrophic storm for the Middle Atlantic and Northeast. It will not be a purely tropical system, with a core of powerful winds near the center, but rather more like a Nor'easter, with strong winds over a larger area," said a forecast report on Friday from AccuWeather.com.
"Damaging winds will affect areas from Virginia up into New York and New England, leading to widespread power outages and property damage," it said.
At $4.3 billion in losses, last year's Irene ranks as one of the 10 costliest hurricanes, according to the Insurance Information Institute, an industry group.
Along North Carolina's fragile Outer Banks barrier islands that jut out into the Atlantic, vacationers in large camper trailers and motor homes streamed out on Friday and the National Park Service prepared to close beaches to off-road vehicles in preparation for gale-force winds and storm surges.
Winds over 50 mph were expected by the weekend, causing strong beach erosion and ocean overwash on Hatteras Island's only highway as Sandy skirts by offshore, Dare County Emergency Management officials said.
Visitors centers and beaches in the Cape Hatteras National Seashore, which attracts thousands of vacationers in the summer but is less crowded in the fall, were to close late on Saturday and remain shut until the storm passes, officials said.
http://news.yahoo.com/hurricane-sandy-menaces-u-slamming-cuba-035520293.html
THX
Well, good. I'll be thinking about you and your family and praying you all are safe!
Oh I'll be going...I def won't be underestimating....
We lost power for 6 days a couple of years ago. A hurricane that was in the Gulf came North with winds that I've never seen before in my life. I got a feeling for what it must be like to be in a real hurricane . . . unbelievable. It was terrifying. People's windows were blown in in my neighborhood, trees down everywhere, roof shingles flying around.
Anyway, we made due with no power. The hardest thing was losing all of our food in the frig and freezer and trying to feed everyone. At the time, my special needs boy was terrified of the dark too. But parts of it felt like an adventure.
Just don't underestimate the danger of water sweetie. If they tell you to go, GO!
Anyway, we made due with no power. The hardest thing was losing all of our food in the frig and freezer and trying to feed everyone. At the time, my special needs boy was terrified of the dark too. But parts of it felt like an adventure.
Just don't underestimate the danger of water sweetie. If they tell you to go, GO!
Thx...I just hope we don't lose power...That's my main concern...
Oh no. I knew you were East but not exactly sure where. You stay safe!
I'm in RI (New England) and I'm scared as h3ll.......
The weather is nuts.
Good luck to all living within the path of this storm.
Good luck to all living within the path of this storm.
Wow, this is really scary stuff. I don't fear a lot of things really but uncontrollable catostrophic weather is on my list! Yes, anyone east, stay safe. (mrs p!)
Even us that are used to Hurricanes have a tendency to take Cat. 1s for granted. Those are usually the ones that kick us in the A$$. I agree with Teko, this may be a strange one.
I dont normally post weather info but they are really making this thing out to be very very potentially dangerous. Living in Florida I am used to Hurricanes, but running up against a cold front like that and it goes BANG, I wouldn't want to be anywhere around it. They are talking 30 foot waves on the coast.
Good information to have in advance. Family is making plans in case some family members who are elderly who live near the open ocean have to be evacuated as happened last time. Its good everyone who could be affected take basic precautions as regards a hurricane in advance. Also there are some weather sites that specifically track hurricanes in general.
LOL, Hey I was listening to the weather channel as I typed it! I did sound real savvy didn't I? LOL,
The EEK! was all mine tho! LOL
The EEK! was all mine tho! LOL
A Nor'easter and a Hurricane are going to collide somewhere over New York. Possibly going in as far as Ohio. They are saying this is the perfect storm and one that has not happened in decades. They are calling it life threatening, with trees down and power out to millions. EEK! .
Yes, that would be what I was talking about, only with much less official terms. LOL :0)
Yes, that would be what I was talking about, only with much less official terms. LOL :0)
Be safe Easterners!! I will pray for your safety.
Pls post after it is over so we know you all are okay.
Pls post after it is over so we know you all are okay.
A Nor'easter and a Hurricane are going to collide somewhere over New York. Possibly going in as far as Ohio. They are saying this is the perfect storm and one that has not happened in decades. They are calling it life threatening, with trees down and power out to millions. EEK!
We're going to get hit with this storm at the same time an arctic-like front rolls in from the North (or West, can't recall), so we're actually due to get some snow and freezing rain (w/ high winds), which is funny, because it has been in the 80's today and yesterday....SO odd for this late in Oct around here.
Crap, have to go from short sleeved shirts to my parka. Ugh. Living in Western PA makes for some interesting weather. Although, I'm not really complaining, other than some nasty snow storms, and t-storms we never have to deal with quakes, hurricanes, tornadoes (seldomly), mud slides, wild fires. Works for me!
I want the job of naming the storms. I'd pick really long, hard to pronounce names. ;0) Just to watch the reporters mess 'em up. LOL
Crap, have to go from short sleeved shirts to my parka. Ugh. Living in Western PA makes for some interesting weather. Although, I'm not really complaining, other than some nasty snow storms, and t-storms we never have to deal with quakes, hurricanes, tornadoes (seldomly), mud slides, wild fires. Works for me!
I want the job of naming the storms. I'd pick really long, hard to pronounce names. ;0) Just to watch the reporters mess 'em up. LOL
"...The Democratic incumbent was traveling to New Hampshire on Saturday and on Monday was due to visit Youngstown, Ohio, and Orlando, Florida..."
Does he get to use Air Force One, when he travels for campaigning purposes?
And if so, do they keep track of what it costs, and charge it to his campaign finances, not me?
I think we've talked about this before, but I can't remember what the answer was.
On-Topic: HOPEFULLY it's hit someplace, and cleared out, but November 6th. I would HATE for cries of "I couldn't make it to the polls to vote (for Obama) so give me an extra day!"
*Republicans wouldn't care if they didn't get to vote, as their guy isn't going to win any of the Eastern Seaboard states anyway.
Does he get to use Air Force One, when he travels for campaigning purposes?
And if so, do they keep track of what it costs, and charge it to his campaign finances, not me?
I think we've talked about this before, but I can't remember what the answer was.
On-Topic: HOPEFULLY it's hit someplace, and cleared out, but November 6th. I would HATE for cries of "I couldn't make it to the polls to vote (for Obama) so give me an extra day!"
*Republicans wouldn't care if they didn't get to vote, as their guy isn't going to win any of the Eastern Seaboard states anyway.
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